LAKELAND, Fla. — A group of four players sat in the Detroit Tigers clubhouse Friday afternoon, playing Truco, a card game popular in Venezuela, among other Spanish-speaking regions of the globe.

One of those card players, mixed in with the veterans, was Tigers rookie Bruce Rondon, bluffing and bidding away, laughing as if he did not have a care in the world.

“That’s (my) thing. (I) just like to have fun, be happy all the time,” Rondon said through a translator after the game. “If everyone is feeling good all the time around (me, I feel) good.”

Several hours later, he pitched like he didn’t have a care in the world.

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Rondon threw a scoreless eighth inning in Friday’s Grapefruit League game against the New York Mets, striking out two and giving up two soft singles.

The ‘Great National Tigers Closer Nightmare’ is over — or at least not as much of a boogeyman as it had seemed just days earlier.

He’d earn the win, his first as a Tigers pitcher, when Tyler Collins hit a prodigious solo home run past the scoreboard behind the right-field wall, giving the Tigers a 3-2 lead that would stand up for the final score.

As important as the results was the fact that Rondon looked more comfortable with his tweaked mechanics, more comfortable pitching later in the game than he had been — more comfortable with pitching, period.

“It was great. (I like) pitching in the late innings. That’s when (I feel) the most comfortable,” Rondon said, admitting he “felt good.”

And as his comfort level grows, so does that of the coaching staff — and by extension, of the fan base.

“It’s been a little bit of a struggle for him, up until today. You know, he hasn’t commanded his pitches as well as you’d like. We looked at some video from last year, and started making some adjustments accordingly,” said pitching coach Jeff Jones, who noticed a couple of things different between how he looked this spring with how he threw at Triple-A Toledo last year. “No, I think he was pleased with how he threw today, and he looked like he was a lot more comfortable.”

He’d just been far too erratic with his control prior to that, allowing five hits and walking five in 3 2/3 innings of work. He’d allowed three earned runs in his last two appearances, as well, sending shock waves of panic through the fan base — if not, as has been both rumored and reported, the organization.

So the Tigers had Rondon skip his last scheduled game appearance to throw a side session with Jones, correcting the fact that he was too upright, and not using his legs enough.

It seemed to work, too, as he had his best outing of the spring.

In all, he’d give up bloop singles to Landon Powell and Josh Satin, sandwiched around a pair of strikeouts of Wilmer Flores and Cesar Puello — the first on a 100 mph fastball, the second on one that registered 99 — before getting Reese Havens to pop out to center to end the inning.

The burly, 25-year-old fireballer knew he’d hit triple digits, without even waiting for the crowd’s reaction. But react, it did.

“Home crowd, he probably wanted to get that triple-digit on the scoreboard. It’s funny how that stuff works, because the people behind me oohed and ahhed when it hit 100 (mph),” Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. “He did fine. We’ll keep running him out there.”

And each of those outings will be just as important as Friday’s seemed to be, coming on the heels of the side session with Jones.

But not too important.

One outing won’t make or break the season, any more than the previous poor ones had.

There are still three weeks left in camp, plenty of time to figure out if the youngster — who only has eight career minor league innings pitched above the Double-A level — can hack it as the team’s closer.

“I told Jonesy, ‘He struggled earlier in the game, let’s try him later in the game, see what happens.’ But, like I said when he was giving up a few hits, runs, I wasn’t getting excited, and I’m not going to get excited over a scoreless inning,” Leyland said.

“But he was better. He was better, under control better, things of that nature. That’s just what it is.

“The fortunate thing is, we’ve played almost 20 games, and we’re still down here for a whole lot longer. I was counting it out today — 22 more days down here. Time is an ally of a lot of guys, right now. ...

“Time-wise, we’re fine.”

He still needs more work on his secondary pitches. Of the 15 pitches he expended Friday, only one (a slider) was anything other than a fastball. Commanding his fastball is step one — adding to the fastball is the next step.

“I would like to see a little more Strike 1, but I would also like to see the secondary stuff to become a little more of a threat. Because if big league hitters discard everything but the fastball, you can throw it 150 (mph), it don’t make any difference,” Leyland said before the game, answering the questions about the biggest story in camp.

“Am I worried at this point? No. Because I’m really not seeing what I didn’t expect right now. I thought I’d see a guy come in here and want to show everybody he could throw it hard, and go after the hitters. Like I said, so far, he’s thrown it hard, they’ve hit it hard. But it’s way too early to make any predictions on how that stands. But I will say that, in saying that — I’ll tell you the same thing I told our guys — he’s got the equipment. Is that equipment tuned up enough to be ready right now? I don’t know the answer just yet.”

At least Rondon appears more comfortable.

Matthew B. Mowery covers the Tigers for Journal Register Company. Email him at matt.mowery@oakpress.com and follow him on Twitter @matthewbmowery.